Not back in Finland. Not in the American Hockey League. And certainly not during his spectacular rookie season in Boston a year ago.
Yet here was the goalie who led the NHL in both goals-against average and save percentage last season still looking for his first victory of the year on Nov. 18. But given the chance to make his first start in three games, Rask made sure he didn't leave anything to chance.
He stopped all 41 shots he faced to not only secure the win, but also earn the shutout as the Bruins downed Florida 4-0 at the Garden on Thursday night.
"That was the game we were hoping to see from him," said Bruins coach Claude Julien. "It was a grind, especially early on and he really kept us in the game with some big timely saves, so it was good for his confidence and it was good for us to see him play that way. If you're going to get your first win, what better way than a shutout?"
Rask agreed with the shutout part, but insisted he wasn't worried about the victories eventually coming.
"I knew it was going to come no matter what," said Rask. "It's not really a great relief. It's just a good win. Obviously you don't get those shutouts too often, so it's always fun to get one and win with that."
Still, Rask did admit that he's never gone through a winless drought this long before.
"This is probably it," said Rask. "This has to be it, but you've got to recognize that if you don't play two games in a row, and I don't think I've played two games in a row, so I don't think of it that way, but this has to be the most [time without a win]."
Rask entered the night with an 0-4-1 record despite playing pretty well with a 2.75 GAA and a .923 save percentage. And while he may have insisted that the lack of wins wasn't weighing on his mind, it was certainly a concern for his teammates.
"We've got a lot of good guys in here, but he's definitely one of the best team guys around," said forward Shawn Thornton, who scored Boston final goal. "So, it's pretty disappointing in the first few games that we couldn't get a win for him, couldn't get the goals we needed. He keeps an upbeat attitude the whole time. He's happy for what's going on here. He doesn't put himself ahead of anyone. We talked before the game that we wanted to get one for him. It's great that he capped it off with a shutout too. He earned it, that's for sure. He had some big stops."
Milan Lucic, who scored Boston's other three goals, including two in a 15-second span, agreed.
"Even the games he lost, he was playing great," said Lucic. "As players, we kind of felt responsible for letting him down. It was great to see him get one here and hopefully he can build off this."
